


Surviving is what people do

by katybar



Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Grief/Mourning, Grieving!John, M/M, Not A Fix-It, RIP Sherlock 2010-2016, dead!Sherlock, just how i'm feeling, no happy ending, post s4 viewing, thank you to everyone who has written stories that have been so important to all of us, who you are matters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-16
Updated: 2017-01-16
Packaged: 2018-09-17 21:51:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 768
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9348032
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/katybar/pseuds/katybar
Summary: Sherlock dies and John grieves. Please heed the tags.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I have a history of trauma and abuse, and trust issues that go along with that, and BBC Sherlock was the first place that I felt safe to really open my heart to, and right now that feels shattered. I hope it won't last. I have learned so much from all of the amazing writers on Archive Of Our Own and elsewhere. A short list: love, friendship, consent, kink, lust, smut, beauty, feelings, comfort, healing.
> 
> I wrote this as part of a larger story that never quite came together. I'm not sure how I feel about continuing to write Sherlock fanfic, but this is how I feel right now.
> 
> Who you are matters.
> 
> There will be more, and I hope there will be people to share it with.

The pub is the way John likes pubs to be -- just loud enough to carry him along, just impersonal enough that no one cares why he’s there or how much he drinks or when he leaves.  And Greg is there, just like Greg has been there every time John has punched the number into his mobile. It’s Friday, because John only does this on Friday.  Or Saturday.  Or sometimes both.  But John draws the line there.  He’s good at that, drawing lines.  Army discipline.  Medical training.  He’s not doing locum work any more, no more clinics, he’s got a job with real responsibilities, no more falling asleep at his desk while the lines build, he needs to be alert, patient, and brilliant all week long.  He is the head of a team, the younger doctors look up to him, and the trickiest work falls to him.  So, this is only for Friday, maybe Saturday, leaving him a day of rest to sleep it off before he heads back to what has become his real life.

Because dying is what people do (perhaps -- John has never been quite sure when it comes to Sherlock, who never acquiesced in being pedestrian before), but surviving is what people do even better, more tediously, more tenaciously, sullenly or brilliantly, but nearly inevitably, it is what they do.  What he does.  

“Do you ever think you see him?”

John just stares for a moment, rattled.  Him.  They don’t use Sherlock’s name, ever.  John calls him my flatmate or that idiot or the big git, depending on his mood, sometimes calls him love, but never out loud, and Greg sticks with ‘he’, and mostly they steer clear of Sherlock altogether.  

John recovers with a grimace and a sigh.  “Every day, mate.  Every fucking day.”

Now Greg stares, and John wants to giggle, he really does, but it comes out wrong, more like a pained animal bleating.  Clearly he’s out of practice with the giggling, but he clarifies “Puts the ‘D’ in PTSD.  It’s a sodding disorder, you know, not a fucking charity picnic.” Then he sobers, and adds hesitantly “but there was this one time” and gulps at his beer, intentionally inhaling half of it in an undignified coughing fit. 

He stares at the table until Greg prompts him “this one time?”

“Yeah, this one time.  It was, I dunno, maybe 6 weeks after.  A little after you decided I was safe on my own,” he acknowleges without venom. “I was taking a stack of his notes to prove something to someone, not that it matters what exactly, but. I got in a cab -- took me forever to hail that cab, never had that problem before that idiot jumped, he was brilliant at cab-hailing among his many other talents…”

Greg’s eyes bore into him and John realizes he is stalling.  “Right, well, I got into that cab finally and set the papers next to me and looked up to tell the cab driver where to take me, and when I sat back, he was -- there. Sitting there in his Belstaff, his scarf knotted around his neck, his curls and his hands and his… “ John is overwhelmed by the memory and his voice dwindles into nothing and he sits in absolute silence while Greg drains half a pint.  Finally he looks up and shakes his head.  “and I just froze. Like breathing would shatter us. And I. I looked away, just for a tic, and when I looked back, he was gone, just. Just the pack of papers, again.”

Greg wants to say something comforting, John can tell, so he grates out, “That was grief, that was mourning, it wasn’t a -- a fucking disorder.  It happens.  Widows.  Parents.  I just wanted. I wanted to hear his voice, you know. I wanted to know what he would have said -- something new. Something that wasn’t my own mind parroting back everything I’ve stored up.” 

What John doesn’t say, doesn’t need to say, is that he’d carried that pack of papers along with him for weeks after, hailed every cab within waving distance, asked to be driven across town or around the block, whatever came out when he opened his mouth, and watched, and waited, and hoped, and when that didn’t work, tried new stacks of files, bundles of Sherlock’s mail, even a year’s worth of  _ Forensics Today, _ but that Sherlock, the one that sat companionably next to John, not spiralling pinwheeling scrabbling his way out of the sky, but just sat with his eyes ready for the next puzzle, his mouth half-open to speak, never appeared again.


End file.
